My Grandfather Joseph Henry Thorn
Joseph Henry Thorn was born in Langley, Bucks in 1875, son of Joseph Thorn and Ellen Portsmouth.
He married Ellen Martha Cooper on 20 Nov 1897 at St Laurence's, Upton cum Chalvey. Joseph died in Slough 16th July 1918.
They had four daughters:
Clara Dorothy (1898 - 1924), Ethel Ellen (1901 - 1987), Edith Mildred (1903 - 1914) and Muriel Lucy (1909 - 2001). A son Joseph, born in the 3rd quarter of 1911, died in infancy along with his mother, Ellen Martha, early in 1912.
In the 1901 census the family are living at 32 Park Street, Slough when Joseph is a foundry labourer. This would probably have been at the Gotha Iron Works where his brother John Thorn was also employed. The name was changed to Windsor Works on the outbreak of war in 1914.
By 1911 they are at 34 Wexham Road and Joseph has become a greengocer-hawker.
Joseph married for a second time in 1916 to Emily M Bray.
He married Ellen Martha Cooper on 20 Nov 1897 at St Laurence's, Upton cum Chalvey. Joseph died in Slough 16th July 1918.
They had four daughters:
Clara Dorothy (1898 - 1924), Ethel Ellen (1901 - 1987), Edith Mildred (1903 - 1914) and Muriel Lucy (1909 - 2001). A son Joseph, born in the 3rd quarter of 1911, died in infancy along with his mother, Ellen Martha, early in 1912.
In the 1901 census the family are living at 32 Park Street, Slough when Joseph is a foundry labourer. This would probably have been at the Gotha Iron Works where his brother John Thorn was also employed. The name was changed to Windsor Works on the outbreak of war in 1914.
By 1911 they are at 34 Wexham Road and Joseph has become a greengocer-hawker.
Joseph married for a second time in 1916 to Emily M Bray.
Clara Dorothy Thorn and Joseph Rickards
At the start of WW2, John enlisted in the RAF and was attached as groundcrew to 458 Squadron of the Royal Australian Air Force. While in North Africa he met a WAAF, Lucille Mary Hepburn and they were married in Algiers on 17 December 1945. Mary died in 1998; John died on 24 May 2007 in Clacton on Sea, Essex. Their son, Hugh Rickards, was born in Slough on 29 December 1946. He died on 1st January, 2016 in Clacton on Sea.
458 RAAF Squadron, served in Bomber Command in World War Two, operating Wellington aircraft in Britain and later in the Mediterranean area.
From the beginning, 458, although being an Australian squadron, was a close family of men from many nations, united in the struggle against tyranny. Flying from their base at Holme-on-Spalding Moor in Yorkshire, Australian, Canadian, South African, New Zealand and British airmen, bombed Germany's European fortress.
Flying to Egypt, they began in the eastern Mediterranean. They carried bombs, mines, torpedoes and depth charges, playing a major part in strangling movement of enemy shipping. After pursuing the retreating enemy from Egypt to Algeria, through Sardinia and north into Italy, their war ended at Gibraltar.
From the beginning, 458, although being an Australian squadron, was a close family of men from many nations, united in the struggle against tyranny. Flying from their base at Holme-on-Spalding Moor in Yorkshire, Australian, Canadian, South African, New Zealand and British airmen, bombed Germany's European fortress.
Flying to Egypt, they began in the eastern Mediterranean. They carried bombs, mines, torpedoes and depth charges, playing a major part in strangling movement of enemy shipping. After pursuing the retreating enemy from Egypt to Algeria, through Sardinia and north into Italy, their war ended at Gibraltar.
Ethel Thorn and Edgar Dunster
